I welcome everyone to this Public Bill Committee. Before we begin, I have a couple of preliminary announcements. Please switch any electronic devices to silent mode; I hope I have done the same, now that I have said that. I also remind hon. Members that, during sittings, tea and coffee are not allowed, just water. There has been no issue with us today, but there have been issues in the past.
Clause 1

Gareth Johnson: It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Ryan, for what I think is the first time. I am grateful for the very constructive approach that hon. Members on both sides of the House have taken to my private Member’s Bill; that has shown the workings of the House of Commons at their best.
It may assist the Committee if I set out the purpose behind amendments 2 and 3, which is to leave out the existing clauses 1 and 2 so that they may be replaced by the new clause and schedule. On Second Reading, a number of hon. Members, including me, noted that the Bill was capable of improvement. It will be clear from  the amendments tabled last Friday that parliamentary counsel certainly agreed with me: some fairly big changes are proposed.
As I said, the purpose of amendments 2 and 3 is to leave out the existing clauses 1 and 2, on the basis that a new clause and schedule are introduced to replace them. The Bill will therefore be narrower in scope, but will more effectively carry out its main intention, which is to end the practice of people wearing medals with intent to deceive. The existing clauses 1 and 2 should not stand part of the Bill.
The purpose of amendment 4 is to amend clause 3, so that the Act will come into force two months after Royal Assent. It is standard practice for an Act to come into force a minimum of two months after Royal Assent, unless there are exceptional circumstances. I suggest that clause 3 be amended to extend the period between Royal Assent and the coming into force of the Act to the more usual two months. The police, courts and lawyers need an opportunity and some time to evaluate the contents of any Act of Parliament that creates a criminal offence; amendment 4 will, I hope, facilitate just that.
New clause 1 is the main change to the Bill: it creates the guts of the Bill for consideration by the Committee. Its purpose is to replace the existing clauses 1 and 2, and it is designed to work with the schedule. The new clause contains all that is necessary to create the new offence. It sets out its scope, delineates the penalties for contravention and provides the basis on which the Secretary of State may amend the schedule where necessary from time to time.
I have prepared draft explanatory notes for the Bill, which are available should colleagues want to peruse them. The first change is to subsection (1). On Second Reading, there was some disquiet about the potential for the Bill to criminalise mere boastfulness. That was because the offence included representing oneself as being “entitled” to wear an award when that was not the case. I considered very carefully the comments made on Second Reading, as well as the recommendation of the Defence Committee in its report, and the new clause makes it an offence to wear an award or something that resembles it.
The awards covered by the Bill are separately listed in the schedule and are, in broad terms, military gallantry awards, three civilian gallantry awards and military campaign awards from just before the first world war to date. It seems sensible not only to cover those medals most widely in circulation, but to recognise that medals awarded before world war one do not seem to be used very frequently to deceive people, in my experience.
The key focus of the offence is the need for a person to have an intention to deceive by wearing the awards. The Committee will note that the proposed changes narrow the scope of the Bill. My intention has always been to target those people who undermine our serving personnel and veterans by wearing awards that they have not been given to try to deceive people. That action undermines the confidence that people have when seeing serving personnel and veterans proudly wearing their medals. The new clause enables the Bill to target those who falsely wear medals.
The new clause does not contain any specific offences and exemptions for various groups. It no longer includes the concept of a person being “entitled” to wear an award. Instead, it places the focus on whether the person wearing the award intends to deceive by doing so. In short, if there is no intent to deceive, no offence can be committed. An offence can be committed only when there is intent to deceive; it cannot be committed accidentally or unintentionally. The wording is critical, as it means that the wonderful custom of family members sporting medals in honour of loved ones is unaffected by the Bill.
For instance, the original Bill included a specific exemption for family members wearing awards in honour of their relatives. It also contained specific provisions exempting other groups, such as actors and those taking part in historical re-enactments. As the offence is drafted in the new clause, it is not necessary to set out lists of specific exemptions. The key question to be asked in any case is whether the person wearing the medals intends to deceive others by doing so. The context in which they are worn will be key in determining that. Family members and friends wearing medals in honour of another will not have the necessary intention to deceive others, so they will not be guilty of an offence.
The need to protect family members and friends from liability under the Bill has been a key concern from day one. I believe that the new clause achieves that protection. Anyone wearing medals awarded to someone else who says, for example, “I am wearing these medals in honour of my wife’s great-uncle Harry, who was at Dunkirk”, will not be caught by the provisions of the Bill.
On the other hand, a rogue family member might decide to wear a relative’s medals to further some deceptive scheme of their own. The existing clause may unintentionally have given such a person an unwarranted protection just because they could claim, “This is my grandfather’s medal.” I am certain that the Bill as redrafted will not in any way hinder the wonderful custom of people wearing medals or ribbons in honour of loved ones.
The medals covered by the Bill are now set out in a schedule, and they include all the military gallantry awards, both current and superseded, three civilian medals and all campaign medals awarded since the beginning of the first world war. The medals are specific so that there can be no doubt about which are covered. The Bill protects awards for valour. The new clause contains a much clearer definition of what those are for the purposes of the Bill. The awards covered are specific gallantry awards and campaign awards approved in respect of campaigns or operations that involve a danger to life from enemy action and a level of rigour that exceeds what might be expected in a non-operational environment.
The new clause makes it an offence to wear an item that has the appearance of being one of the awards specified in the schedule. That will ensure that those who wear replicas or copies of medals will be committing an offence if they intend to deceive by doing so. It will also ensure that the police do not have to forensically examine any medal worn with the intent to deceive in order to prove the offence. Having an article that simply appears to be one of the awards in the schedule is sufficient.
The process has been a fairly steep learning curve for me. I have learned an awful amount about the etiquette of wearing medals. I have learned some things that I never thought I would about the range of physical items  that can represent a medal, depending on the occasion. Subsection (2) of the new clause expressly provides that the offence is committed if any of the items commonly worn to represent the award of an honour are worn with the intention to deceive others. It includes ribbons, clasps, stars, bars and miniatures, but the list as set out in the new clause is not exhaustive.
I move on to subsection (3). The new clause makes no change to the penalties that may be imposed on conviction, but it more clearly sets out the level of fines to be imposed in the different jurisdictions in our United Kingdom. As before, the offence will be able to be tried only in magistrates courts in England and Wales and their equivalents in Scotland and Northern Ireland. In all jurisdictions, the fine is set at the standard level 5; however, the amount of such a fine differs between jurisdictions. In England and Wales, the fine will be unlimited, while in Scotland and Northern Ireland the maximum fine will be £5,000.
A person convicted of the offence may also be sentenced to a maximum of three months’ imprisonment. I do not envisage that a custodial sentence will be imposed for this offence in any but the very worst cases. However, the possibility of a custodial sentence—it will be an imprisonable offence—will enable courts to impose a community order or community payback where appropriate. The offence would be committed against society, so it is appropriate that courts have that discretion. Indeed, courts have imposed just such a sentence in the past when this offence existed previously.
Let me clarify the changes to subsection (4). The new clause allows the Secretary of State to amend the schedule when necessary by adding or removing awards and by amending the description of awards listed. The power is necessary to avoid the need for Parliament to amend the Act by primary legislation every time a new medal is approved, which might become onerous in the case of campaign medals. Unfortunately, we cannot exclude the possibility of future conflicts, so it makes sense to allow for awards to be added to the schedule in that way.
The power can also be used to amend the schedule by removing medals no longer considered to be in need of protection. We envisage that these would be primarily campaign medals relating to campaigns or wars outside living memory.

Gareth Johnson: Commemorative medals do not come under the umbrella of the Bill: if the award is not for valour, it is not covered by this legislation. The hon. Gentleman would have to bring his own private Member’s Bill if he wanted to add the type of medals he speaks about. Campaign medals are covered by the legislation and there is a very set test that I will outline in a moment that any Secretary of State has to follow before adding any items to the schedule.
The list could have gone on ad infinitum: there are so many different types of awards, so many different commemorative-class medals, ribbons and so on that could have been added to the list. Part of my intention was to keep the scope of the Bill narrow so that it would be well understood and therefore manageable as a piece of legislation to go through Parliament.

Brendan O'Hara: rose—

Gareth Johnson: I give way to the hon. Gentleman.

Brendan O'Hara: I understood that the Bill was intended to stop people parading in medals and awards to which they are not entitled. If the Bill covers only medals for valour, what is to stop the Walter Mitty characters simply continuing to do as they do, using long service or other medals, not medals for valour, in the hope that the public do not read the small print or understand the insignia and the ribbons attached to them? Surely, unless there is a blanket ban, it does not really address the problem.

Gareth Johnson: Fraud law already exists, so that is dealt with separately. Again, it is difficult to get a handle on exactly how many people are guilty of this misbehaviour—as it is at the moment, rather than being a criminal offence. However, I would take issue with the hon. Gentleman’s comments. Numerous military charities that are fully supportive of the Bill have contacted me. They say that, particularly around the time of Remembrance Sunday and Armistice Day, numerous people have contacted them to say, “I’ve got this character at my local service and they are doing a massive disservice to the people who attend.” I am not saying that this is rampant or that there are thousands of people around the country, but there are certainly hundreds.
That is just one part—to tackle these Walter Mitty characters, but another, perhaps the most important part, of the Bill is about giving people confidence. It is a deterrent. It ensures that when you see somebody, you can have confidence that that individual is bona fide. That is one of the main reasons behind the Bill; it is a secondary purpose to catch those Walter Mitty characters and punish them through the law. I do not expect hundreds of arrests to flow from the Bill, but it is right to have it. Such legislation exists in most countries in the world, particularly in America, where the Stolen Valor Act protects people who have won the Purple Heart, for example. I understand that it works very well around the world and gives veterans the protection they deserve. It is high time that in this country, which has one of the richest military histories in the world, we protected our veterans in exactly the same way that we see in most other countries.
I shall move on to subsection (5)—back to the dryness of my speech. It contains clearly defined criteria that an award will have to meet in order to be added to the schedule. It will have to be a gallantry award, military or civilian, or a campaign medal awarded on the basis of risk and rigour. In the United Kingdom, a campaign medal will be approved to acknowledge a particular campaign or operation only if it meets the criteria of “risk and rigour”. Broadly speaking, this means that the campaign or operation must have involved a risk of danger to life from enemy action, and it must have involved a level of rigour that is significantly greater than that experienced in more peaceful times. Those criteria are stringent and the bar is deliberately set high to ensure that when awards are made, they reflect the value of the sacrifice made by those who participated in the campaign.
Moving on to subsection (8), any regulations to amend the schedule would have to comply with the affirmative procedure and be approved by a resolution of each House. Finally, the purpose of amendment 5 is to list all the awards protected by the Bill, divided into two parts: gallantry awards and campaign awards. Part 1 of the schedule lists the gallantry awards that are covered, while part 2 lists the campaign awards. I hope that the Bill gets to Third Reading. I thank the Ministry of Defence for its assistance, both at ministerial and official  level, in ensuring that the Bill is tidy, presentable and will, I believe, provide a valuable deterrent to people who wish to mimic those who have served our country so valiantly.

Kirsten Oswald: I thank the hon. Member for Dartford for all his work in bringing the Bill here today. I also thank the Clerks, who have been extremely patient with me, in the same way that the Ministry of Defence has clearly been very supportive of the hon. Gentleman. I know that he has done a significant amount of work to bring the Bill here today and that he has done that without the benefit of a third party campaign group or a charity, which I think is worth noting.
I had a large number of questions when I came in here today and to the hon. Gentleman’s credit he has answered them with no problem. That is incredibly helpful. A number remain, but it is interesting to see this process going through. It is a privilege to speak, on behalf of my party, for the armed forces and veterans. The spirit of the Bill is very much in tune with its views  on supporting our armed forces and veterans communities and on ensuring that they appreciate that we are absolutely behind them and the work that they do. He and I have discussed that the Bill would not have been my main or first priority in terms of the armed forces and veterans activity, but I appreciate that he is bringing it here for all the right reasons.
I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman that people should not wear medals that they are not entitled to wear. If somebody is seeking to deceive by using or wearing a medal, that is clearly unacceptable. I am less convinced by his concern about people lacking or losing confidence in our armed forces because of the people who deceive in that way. I believe it is a small number of people and I do not think that it has that effect. However, I think that the sentiment is well placed.
The hon. Gentleman spoke interestingly about people who wear medals and turn up at commemorations, perhaps those of family members, and that is important. We must not let that be caught by the Bill. In my little area, a number of people attend Remembrance Day wearing family medals. It is important to them to be able to do that. It is important to have clarity in ensuring that those people are not covered by the scope of the Bill. A number of people here will march with their own medals, but there are those of us who march alongside our local veterans. I have the privilege every year of marching alongside the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen and Women and alongside Brigadier Monty Cohen. The respect that we would be showing to people such as him who have been through incredibly difficult situations is what has brought the hon. Gentleman here today.
That brings me on to the issue of the national defence medal. Having discussed that with Ms Ryan, I have agreed that I am not going to pursue that in any detailed way here because I understand that that is not within the scope of the Bill. I appreciate her considering the amendment. It was not selected on this occasion, but that consideration is very helpful. My concern, which flows from that, is that all our veterans show valour. I wonder whether we might be looking slightly through the wrong lens here because everybody who goes into our armed services is, by definition, showing valour.
It would be useful if the hon. Gentleman clarified a small number of points for me. He spoke about people accidentally and unintentionally deceiving. It would be interesting to hear a bit more about how that could happen; I am not entirely sure how it would happen. He spoke about the “offence against society”. If that is a turn of phrase he is using, that is fine. If it is something more, I am not understanding it and it would be useful to have his clarification.
I would also like clarification on the extent to which this would apply in Scotland in particular. The hon. Gentleman spoke about the appropriate court in Scotland. It would be useful to know what that means exactly. Does the Bill require a legislative consent motion from the devolved Governments? Does it require legislation in Scotland, for instance? Is it compatible with the differences in law that exist in the constituent countries of the United Kingdom in its current form? It would be particularly helpful if those questions could be answered. Again, I thank the hon. Gentleman for all his work thus far.

Mike Penning: It was a subtle hint.
There is one area that we will look at, given the powers in the Bill, when we get some time: the UN Medal. Ever more of our troops are in danger and at risk and fit the criteria. Quite rightly, they get the UN Medal, but it does not come under this. The hon. Member for Dartford is absolutely right: there is an unlimited number of medals and honours that we could look at, some of which do not cover a traditional UN role, such as the Cyprus situation, in a buffer zone. There are really different situations—not least the troops whom we recently sent to South Sudan. We are in that environment today, under the UN.
I want to draw my comments to a close and say congratulations: it is difficult to get to this position. Hon. Members have had private Member’s Bill after private Member’s Bill way up the list but they have not come to fruition, often because those hon. Members have not been pragmatic enough. Having a narrowly focused Bill such as this, which specifically targets people that hurt other people’s feelings and memories, is absolutely spot on. I congratulate my hon. Friend and hope we can move on swiftly with the voting.

Stephen Doughty: It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Ryan. I intend to be very brief as well.
First, I offer my wholehearted support for the Bill. If I had got lucky in the private Members’ ballot, I would have thought of introducing something similar, so when I heard that the hon. Member for Dartford had brought this Bill forward, I was delighted to add my name as one of its supporters. I praise his cross-party approach and generosity in answering the many reasonable questions. He has clearly had a difficult job in narrowing the Bill down, but he has found a happy balance that will make a big difference to the offence of wearing medals inappropriately on the part of those who simply do not deserve them or have not been awarded them.
When we read some of the citations, let alone the wider stories, particularly around some of the medals awarded for the highest valour, we understand how inappropriate such impersonation is and the offence caused to serving members or those who have been in receipt of such awards.
This weekend, I was standing outside the West House in Penarth, our town council headquarters; memorialised on the wall were two Penarth recipients of the Victoria Cross in world war one. Reading such citations, particularly when they are for one’s own constituents, past or present, is a humbling experience for all of us.
As I mentioned earlier, I have seen the many regrettable characters who attempt to portray themselves inappropriately in this way. There are many examples one can look at online, on YouTube. People have rightly been challenged by actual serving members of the armed forces, and those who have actually been in receipt of these medals have rightly asked such people to explain themselves. Unfortunately, I think the practice is more widespread than perhaps we realised.
I am pleased to hear what has been said about the issue of intent and those who have mental illnesses. There was an example at Remembrance Day last year of an individual who is well known to the community and is not necessarily causing offence to anybody; there is acceptance that this individual literally thinks they were serving and had awards. There is a general sense in the community that we would not want to see someone like that criminalised. There are clearly others, though, who are doing it for wrong reasons, or even to get money or other things.
I shall briefly raise three issues. I have already mentioned commemoratives, something we might need to return to in the future. I can see how these can be used to attempt to deceive, but I also understand that there is a great deal of debate about the issue in the veterans community, particularly when it comes to people who feel they should have been awarded something, but never were.

Stephen Doughty: I thank the Minister for his generous reply and will certainly take him up on that offer. This issue is of concern to many people. As I said, I do not want to criminalise people with army surplus clothing and so on, but I have seen people fundraising in standard PCS—personal clothing system—issue uniform without medals on, clearly inappropriately, who were not serving members of the armed forces.
I offer my full support for the Bill and know that it will enjoy support across the country. It is very important and I again praise the hon. Member for Dartford for the way he has brought it forward. I hope we can take it to the next stage.

Gareth Johnson: I shall briefly go through some of the points that have been raised. First, the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire asked me whether the offence can be committed unintentionally. It cannot be committed unintentionally: there needs to be a specific intent to deceive. I used the word “society”, but that is purely a phrase. It is up to the courts to decide the appropriate sentence, but it often makes sense that one who affronts society pays something back to society. Consequently, the offence will be publishable by imprisonment.
Fines used to be set for levels 1 to 5 right across the United Kingdom, with level 5 being the maximum. That was changed fairly recently to an unlimited fine in England and Wales for most magistrates courts cases. That is why there is a slight difference in the penalties in the Bill. The fine can be up to level 5 for Northern Ireland and Scotland, but for England and Wales it simply says “a fine”. An unlimited fine would therefore be available for the magistrates to impose.
I am afraid I cannot read my own handwriting on the last point I wanted to make. If hon. Members want to intervene on any point I have not covered, I will do my best.

Gareth Johnson: That is right. Matters involving the military are obviously not devolved matters, and the Bill therefore affects the whole of the United Kingdom. There does not need to be additional consultation. I understand that there is a debate in the Scottish Parliament tomorrow about justice, so that is an opportunity for MSPs to make contributions about this issue if they see fit.
The hon. Member for North Durham made an excellent speech, but to clarify one issue he raised, replicas will be covered if there is an intention to deceive when wearing them. If somebody has replicas of their own medals, that is perfectly fine; nobody is being deceived. The Bill will cover anything that resembles a medal or award that is covered by the new schedule. If a replica resembles one of those, that is sufficient if there is an intention to deceive. The reason for that is partly to save the police from having to examine forensically anything that someone is wearing.
I thank the hon. Member for Barnsley Central for his assistance and his constructive approach to the matter. He is absolutely right about the medal system being incredibly complex—it really is. Along with other hon. Members, he rightly mentioned that this is not a party political Bill in any way, shape or form. The Bill is as much a Labour party Bill as it is a Scottish National party Bill and a Conservative Bill—it is even a Liberal Democrat Bill. [Hon. Members: “Steady on!”] All right; it is not a party political Bill. It is a Bill that we have debated the merits of, and it is not something any political party would in any way take credit for.
The hon. Members for Argyll and Bute and for Cardiff South and Penarth rightly mentioned mental health issues. The offence in the Bill requires specific intent. If somebody is not capable of forming the necessary intent to commit the offence, they are not guilty of the offence. The Crown Prosecution Service has an additional safeguard—as I am sure does the procurator fiscal in Scotland—whereby a prosecution has to be in the public interest to be brought. I submit that it would not be in the public interest to bring a case in which someone clearly had such serious mental health problems as to not be capable of committing this offence. I hope I have allayed hon. Members’ fears on that.
There is scope to add additional medals, such as commemorative medals, to the new schedule, as we see fit. A colleague of mine said, in a rather tongue-in-cheek way, that a man flu medal should be added to the list. That is not going to happen.
The final question was why the Bill was brought before Parliament. I was pulled out in the ballot—that is why. This is the only opportunity I have ever had to bring in a Bill.